The Red Adder
by robster72
Summary: Complete. Commander Blackadder and Baldrick get put into stasis for a crime against Space Corp. A crime that will have reverberations millions of years in the future with the crew of Red Dwarf. All reviews welcome!
1. Iced Blackadder

Red Dwarf characters owned by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor and Blackadder characters by Richard Grant and Ben Elton. With thanks to Cmar for beta reading this for me! All reviews welcome!

**Chapter One – The Red Adder**

Commander the Lord Blackadder stomped miserably down the corridor. Space Admiral Melchet, the man with less brain cells than he had moustaches had summoned him to his presence. This was the 23rd century, man had straddled the stars, created space ships so vast they blocked the sun and had nearly invented a non-annoying ring tone. They also had holophones. You didn't need to be in the same place as the person you spoke to.

But Melchet liked the personal touch. It was all to do with the Investors in Space people who were sweeping the Corp.

Blackadder touched his comlink.

"Blackadder to Bald…"

He didn't finish what he was about to say. A certain smell… No, it was wrong to use the word smell. Smell is too poor a word for such an emanation as was pervading the Space Station. Besides, with smell one has a source. You can say, get rid of that and you get rid of the smell! Although the smell, for lack of a better word, came from Baldrick; what part of him was something that no-one (apart from one brave Doctor who now has a statue dedicated to him in the foyer of the Medical College - well, he did; the statue got moved to somewhere slightly airier like Deep Space) has ever found.

"Yes, Milord?" For centuries, like a birthmark, or a particularly disgusting genetic disease, the Baldricks had been serving the Blackadders.

Blackadder stroked his small black beard. "Balders, what did I tell you about the underpants?"

His small monkey like face screwed up in concentration. "Eeerrrmm, to change them more frequently than once a decade?"

"Yes, also the optimum word is "under", you wear them under your space suit."

"Yes, Milord…" There was a shuffling of clothes and a screeching sound.

"Not now! Not now! For God's sake Baldrick, what is under your space suit must forever be hidden! Science, nay the universe, is not ready for such a sight!"

"Yes Milord."

The tannoy blared out. "Lord Blackadder and his assistant to General Melchett please."

"Come on Balders, that's the third time he's called us in as many minutes. What have you done?"

An air of injured innocence took Baldrick. Well, injured at any rate, after Blackadder hit him. "I've done nothing, my Lord!"

"Nothing?" Baldrick raised his fist again. "Let us not forget the last time you had 'done nothing' you had in fact let that asteroid hit the Earth."

"I didn't let it hit the Earth! I sent several missiles after it!"

"Yes, Baldrick, you also missed. The asteroid, or aster grain of sand, slightly stunned a hedgehog in Milton Keynes, whilst the missiles wiped Slough off the map. Fortunately we managed to pass it off as urban redevelopment and I managed to wangle an architectural award out of it, so I'm going to ask you again. What have you done this time?"

"Not a thing!" There was a silence in which all that could be heard was Blackadder's eyebrows raising. "Well apart from…"

"Apart from what, Baldrick… Tell me now or I slice you into thin slivers and feed you to the Space Weevils."

There was a sound of many space boots on hard metal floor and they were surrounded by heavily armed Space Marines. General Melchett, his moustache quivering with rage, stomped up to them. "Lord Blackadder and …" He waved his hand towards Baldrick.

"Baldrick, your Generalship," simpered Baldrick.

"Moordrick, I sentence you to an eternity in Stasis!"

Melchett looked behind him; several wounded Space Marines came running past him, bearing the unmistakeable marks of battle. The sound of laser fire and screams was getting closer.

Melchett, still shaking, pointed a finger at Blackadder. "You have unleashed a terrible plague on mankind!"

"They're not a plague, more a creature with teeth liketh thith!" said Baldrick, putting his fingers in his mouth to show teeth. "I just thought I'd take them for a walk, they looked so bored on their own!"

A roaring sound started to echo around them, this time getting closer...

"Put them into stasis! They must never see the light of day again!"

* * *

Three million years later a dilapidated space ship was heading home. However, like a drunk man after a night on the town, it was taking the metaphorical equivalent of the long way home to get a Chinese and phone up all his friends at 2 am and then again at 3 am to apologise for calling them at 2 am. Calling a taxi. Forgetting where he lives and ending up in a part of town he doesn't know but where the Rottweilers gather in gangs for fear of being mugged.

Although Holly would never actually admit it, they were, technically speaking, lost… He had the vague idea where Earth should be but for some reason he couldn't find it. The closer they got to the area it should be, the more detritus and wreckage they encountered of man's race to the stars. This detritus and wreckage was of warships now. All gleaming metal and guns. All torn to shreds. But where was the planet Earth?

He sometimes regretted the fact he didn't have shoulders because if he did he would have shrugged them. What can you do? He got back to reading his collection of Agatha Christie novels. He tried briefly to grow a Hercule Poirot moustache but Rimmer told him it made him look like he had been drinking coffee. Out of spite he gave Rimmer a huge handlebar moustache. It took him all day to notice he had it…

Poirot was just calling everyone into the room to explain how clever he was when he heard a beep sound. That is, Holly heard the beep sound, all Poirot probably heard was his little grey cells crackling.

Holly looked at the screen.

Another derelict…

Where was the beeping coming from? Oh yes, the stasis booths. This one had two still active! He'd better tell someone!

Where was the crew? Kryten was busy cleaning the fridge for the seventh time today, Rimmer was working to a very strict timetable and not actually achieving very much. Lister was… Even a computer could get disgusted sometimes and he turned off his viewing monitor in that room.

* * *

The screen in front of Kryten flicked on.

"Oi!"

"I beg your pardon?" said Kryten, looking up, a little frilly cleaning hat on his head.

"Oi! What's happening in Cleaning City?"

"Well, Mr Lister insists on leaving his underpants in the fridge, he says they feel more comfortable to wear suitably cooled." Kryten removed a pair of crusty underpants from the fridge with a pair of engineering tongs. "Unfortunately, each time he does that means I have to industrially clean the fridge." He dropped the underpants into a container marked with a sign saying "Bio-chemical Waste – For God's Sake Never Open!" He dropped the tongs, which were smoking slightly, in afterwards and sealed the container. A scutter trundled up behind him with a small trolley to eject it all into deep space.

"What am I doing here?"

"I ask myself that everyday…" muttered Kryten. He assumed it was some sort of test that if he passed would allow him into Silicon Heaven.

"Signal! Signal, that was it, we're getting a signal from an old Space Station up ahead. Looks like there are a couple of people left in Stasis there."

The Cat, who was curled up on top of the fridge, opened an eye at this. "Say what, head?"

"There are a couple of people in stasis in the space station up ahead."

"People? Are they female, as in soft and squidgy?" He sat up at this.

"Dunno, the computer records are pretty patchy on the station."

In one fluid movement he stood up on the fridge and somersaulted onto the ground. "When will we get there?"

"About four hours."

"Four hours! It takes me three hours just to comb my eyebrows!" There was a yowling sound and the Cat scampered off.

"I'll tell the others," said Kryten and bustled off.

* * *

Several hours later the Starbug docked with the space station and three people dressed in space suits, armed with bazookoids, walked onto the station. Rimmer was bravely and selflessly (according to him at any rate) keeping the engines running on board the Starbug just in case he had to make a heroic escape.

The metal corridor was full of shot holes and bits of wire and cable hanging from the ceiling. Several lights were fizzling up ahead and condensation was dripping pretty much constantly from the ceiling.

There were several patches of green slime on the floor that they circled carefully.

Kryten was looking at this with lust in his eyes. This whole space station needed cleaning! And it looked like weeks of work! Possibly even months!

"What the smeg happened here?" asked Lister.

"Unknown," said Kryten, waving a small gadget in front of him. It was beeping at him, but sadly that just told him the batteries needed replacing. "Holly, what records do we have of this ship?"

"Dunno. It was ejected into deep space three million years ago for some reason. The stasis pods are up ahead, section E15."

The stasis pods were lined up in front of them. Two of them had claw marks in them and the inmates had been dragged out. Half of them were skeletonised and the other half was still alive and frozen in time…

Two pods were untouched. One said "Moordrick" and the other said "Lieutenant Commander The Lord Blackadder".


	2. Thawed Blackadder

Red Dwarf characters owned by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor and Blackadder characters by Richard Grant and Ben Elton. With thanks to Cmar for beta reading this for me! Also thanks to Sunrise of the tango factory, Cazflibs, Cmar and Radar-fox for the reviews so far! All very much appreciated! All reviews welcome!

**Chapter Two – The Red Adder**

Lister wiped the condensation off the front of the stasis pods to peer inside. The glowing red light above them showed they were still active… Frozen in time for an eternity.

"Are they babes?" asked the Cat hopefully.

"Not unless you like beards…" said Lister.

"In the Cat race whiskers are a thing of beauty…"

Lister looked in Baldrick's stasis pod and recoiled back. "No way that thing could be regarded as beautiful…" He looked at the label again to confirm that Baldrick was in fact human and not some strange hybrid. Nope, definitely human.

Blackadder looked like a fine distinguished officer but there was definitely some indefinable element of weaseliness about him…

Kryten waddled over to the controller. "Well, let's release them, shall we?"

"Hang on, Kryters," said Lister. "We don't know what they've done! There might be a good reason they are in stasis!"

The communicator crackled. "Everything alright, Listy? I'm keeping the engines running for you!"

"We're fine…"

"Last time you said that, that genetically mutated bowl of spaghetti tried to force its way on board… Your idea of fine and mine are so far apart you could fit Jupiter between them, no, bigger than that - your bottom… Can I talk to Kryten?" Lister handed the communicator over.

"Kryten?"

"Yes sir."

"Don't press any buttons."

"No sir."

"Don't release any slathering creatures!"

"No sir."

"Don't find any new inventions and think, I don't know why this device is surrounded by skeletons but I'll try it out anyway!"

"No sir…"

"Just get back on board!"

"No sir, I mean, yes sir."

Lister shook his head and took back the communicator. "We can't leave these people here for an eternity, man, I'm letting them go."

Rimmer started speaking again. "According to the ship's computer they are there due to breaking Space Corp Directive 24534."

"What's that? Wearing blue out of season?"

"Actions relating to the utter destruction of the planet Earth…"

"Woh!" said Lister. "I bet they used that a lot!"

"Only the once, according to this," said Rimmer. "You see we should really keep them…" There was a beeping sound. "What's that noise?"

The Cat was busy pressing various buttons.

"Cat, man, what are you doing?" asked Lister.

"That officer dude is wearing some smart clothes, I wanna ask him who his tailor is…"

"Oh, it's only the Cat," said Rimmer. "He wouldn't be able to turn off the stasis field, he's too stupid…"

"Stasis field raising." said the computer.

"Oh smeg!" said Rimmer. The sound of Star Bug's engines could be heard as Rimmer started revving them up.

"Rimmer, you stay here, man!" said Lister. "Kryten go and stop that cowardly smeghead!"

"Certainly sir!" He bustled off in the direction of the cargo hangar.

With a hissing sound the two pods opened.

Blackadder smiled at Lister and the Cat. "Thank goodness the Space Corp is showing some common sense." He looked about. "I take it the common sense is due to the lack of General Melchett. His moustache finally made a bid for freedom and strangled him, did it?"

"No."

He looked about at the other stasis pods. "This place really is filthy. You aren't the cleaning staff, are you?"

"No."

"How long were we in stasis for?"

"Three…"

"Days?"

"No."

"Months?"

"No."

"Years? My football cards must be worth a fortune now!"

"Three million years."

Blackadder paled at this. Baldrick just took this in his stride. Mainly because he couldn't count above ten unless he took his shoes off…

"Oh bugger… So we're stuck three million years from Earth… Joy! I couldn't be happier if my house had just burnt down and my wife had just run off with the house insurance documents and the firemen. So we're stuck?"

"Yes."

"Where is the Earth, by the way?" asked Blackadder.

"We were going to ask you that same question," said Lister.

"Balders?"

"Yep!"

"You know those creatures you released?"

"What, the fluffy ones?"

"Yes, the fluffy ones with the big teeth."

"What, the fluffy ones with the big teeth that ate rock?"

"Yes, the fluffy ones with the big teeth that ate rock and were impervious to blaster fire and practically immortal. Basically the genetically engineered mining GELFS that, due to a small flaw, are practically invulnerable, can live in the vacuum of space and breed like it's a Friday night…"

"Yes."

"Where were they headed when you last saw them?"

"The Earth."

"Brilliant! Brilliant! You have been responsible for the utter destruction of the Earth and probably this section of the galaxy. You have also trapped us three million years from Earth. Well done, Balders, you've excelled yourself!"

"Don't worry sir, for I have a cunning plan to get us back home!"

"Let us not forget, Baldrick, that your last cunning plan has seemingly led to the utter destruction of the human race."

"A mistake any half witted bungling incompetent could have made, sir. This one will work though!"

"I don't think I'll jump and down with joy, remember you solved your mother's leaking tap problem by burning down her house."

"It dried it out, didn't it?"

"Yes, it also led to the Second Great Fire of London. Do you know the Germans gave you an Iron Cross for destroying more of London than they managed in Two World Wars?"

There was the sound of someone being forcibly dragged down the corridor towards them and Rimmer was frogmarched in, accompanied by Kryten.

When Rimmer saw an officer, he immediately stood to attention and saluted. "Good morning, sir! May I say what an absolute honour and delight it is to finally have a Space Corp Officer on board, sir! I have been looking after this ship for the past four years, sir!" He looked at Baldrick. "By the way sir, what type of genetic mutant is that with you…" He simpered to Baldrick. "No offence!"

"You cannot offend those without a brain."

"Urrr?" said Baldrick as his one remaining brain cell, which was dying of loneliness, tried to translate this while keeping him standing up… It failed.

Blackadder looked over the four Red Dwarf crewmembers. "Do I take it that the human race now consists of us?"

"Yes," said Lister.

"Well it's hardly a race now, more a waddle. Okay, Balders, let's hear your plan for saving the Earth and more importantly, me?"

"Well, the way I see it is we are three million years from the disintegrated remains of the Earth."

"Yes."

"What we need is a time machine, go back in time and stop them eating the Earth!"

"Brilliant! Brilliant! Well, I'll look over here for a time machine whilst you…"

"Actually sir," said Rimmer. "We do actually have a time machine, but it's never been too much help to us because we don't know where the Earth is or was or have any way to travel there."

Blackadder raised an eyebrow; he decided to raise two since it was quite an important moment for him. "And you are?"

"Rimmer, your officerness."

"And your rank is?"

"Second Technician, your eminence."

"Second Technician, so you are responsible for vending machines perchance?"

"Yes, your worshipfulness."

"Forgive me not jumping up and down for joy, Zimmer but what does a second technician in charge of degunking chicken soup machines know about time travel?"

"We found one," said Lister.

"And you can operate it?" asked Blackadder. "Forgive my scepticism, but you look like you came from the same gene pool as Balders and that pool is so shallow that an ant wouldn't get its feet wet."

"You're beginning to get on my tits," said Lister. "Yeah, we can operate it."

Rimmer started to salute Blackadder (as a side note, in the time taken for him to salute, an intelligent society formed in Baldrick's armpit, discovered fire, water and had just reached the philosophical milestone of 'I stink therefore I am' when Kryten in a bid to stifle Baldrick's smell sprayed deodorant on him and wiped them out).

"What is it, Brimmer?"

"We have attached it to the Starbug, your beardfullness. If you give us the co-ordinates we can return to Earth! There is only one thing I ask in return…"

"Yeeesssss?"

"Make me an officer!"

"Rimmer?"

"My friends call me Arnold."

"Rimmer, if you get us home I will do everything I can to make you an officer," Blackadder turned to walk up the corridor towards the Starbug. "The day Baldrick becomes Space Admiral," he muttered.

* * *

Blackadder had somehow managed to make himself at home in Starbug and somehow (no-one was entirely certain how) managed to take over the running of the place. He was just so suave and debonair it seemed stupid to refuse him. Even Lister, who, with Baldrick, was playing guess the smell, let him carry on with few comments.

"So Holly, you're the ship's computer then?"

"Yep."

"Tell me, how does this time travel thing work? Surely the only way to punch a hole through the space/time continuum is the fine control of nano black holes?"

"Yep."

"Isn't that extraordinarily dangerous?"

"Not for a computer like me," said Holly with a smug grin. "It's unpossible for me to make a mistak." As he said this he somehow bumped his head on the glass screen.

"Right, right…" said Blackadder, fixing him with one steely eye. "And if you do, and I'm squashed smaller than a weevil's wedding tackle, I want you to know one thing."

"What's that then?"

"It'll have to wait Rimmer's coming in, actually if he starts to salute again I'll write that series of novels on the Crimean War I've been meaning to start…"

"Excuse me sir," said Rimmer. "We are ready to go now, your officer-ship, we just need the exact co-ordinates of the Earth."

"Certainly," said Blackadder, getting to his feet. "I've studied the navigation computers and we are standing where, if the Earth still existed, Mrs Miggins' Pie shop would be…"

"Hang on, what about causality!" said Holly.

"What about causality?"

"Well, I don't know," admitted Holly. "It's just if someone talks about time travel you have to mention that and not killing your grandfather or something."

"Why would I want to do that?" asked Rimmer. "I quite liked the old duffer."

"No, but if you travel in time and kill your grandfather you might not be born!"

"Well, I don't know about you, Holly," said Rimmer. "But I'm not in the habit of killing old people just to test out some weird law!"

"Yes, but if you accidentally…"

"Holly, apart from me accidentally killing the entire crew of Red Dwarf, and that incidentally was the Captain's fault for giving me such an important job, I have never killed anyone! Why would I start now?"

"Yes, but the theory states…"

"If I travel back in time the first thing I'd do is find out the lottery numbers; it won't be to find old people to kill! You're weird!"

This from a man who puts his underpants on clothes hangers, thought Holly.

Kryten looked up from the screen. "Co-ordinates loaded and stored, let's go home…"

Blackadder reached an arm over the console and pressed the button…


	3. Time travel and coffee shops

Red Dwarf characters owned by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor and Blackadder characters by Richard Grant and Ben Elton. With thanks to Cmar for beta reading this for me! Also thanks to Sunrise of the tango factory, Cazflibs, Cmar and Radar-fox for the reviews so far! All very much appreciated! All reviews welcome!

**Chapter Three – The Red Adder**

It would be wrong to say that nothing happened when Blackadder pressed the button. A lot of things happened: Kryten spotted a patch of dust he had somehow missed, Lister found an old sandwich under the console, which, after he scraped off the mushrooms and small colony of ants, he started to eat. Rimmer was on number four of his 'Imperative these items are done today!' list (for those interested, the first four were wake up, brush hair, clean teeth and the one he was on now was 'For God's sake become an officer!' The Cat was mulling over some new fashion designs.

Numerous things happened in the universe, most of which were extraordinarily dull and only of interest to people who study astrophysics or people who need a thick book to stop the coffee table falling over…

What didn't happen, and this was a surprise to Blackadder, was a lot of expensive special effects, a big light show, the stars changing colour etc. I could say this was because it was a television series and didn't have the cash, but the real reason for this was that their view was suddenly blocked by the coffee shop in the way…

Most people in coffee shops expect to see big sofas and intelligent looking people with laptops trying to look important and busy (it's all a farce, they're really writing fanfiction along the lines of "Rob, handsome and daring writer, immediately became best friends and leader to all the Red Dwarf and Blackadder cast, and incidentally he was thinking of growing a beard…"). What people don't expect to see (unless they have been taking some expensive drugs, and not something like Vitamin C, which although technically a drug has never hit the dance floors with quite the force of some of the others, since it's good for you) is a Starbug space ship… For this reason there was a lot of screaming and people running for the exit…

Blackadder clapped his hands together. "Well, we're at Mrs Miggins' coffee shop. Balders, your plan actually worked!"

"I've got an important question, your eminence…" asked Rimmer.

"Have you," said Blackadder as he walked to the exit. He pressed the button and some steps elongated out of the ship, crushing a rather expensive red leather settee.

"I was wondering if you'd like to hear it?" asked Rimmer, galloping alongside Blackadder like a deranged flamingo.

"No…"

"Right," said Rimmer. "I'll ask it anyway…"

Blackadder pressed the bell on the counter. For some obscure reason people had run away when a large space ship had appeared out of nowhere and landed in the coffee shop.

"Well, your eminence, I was wondering how appearing in a coffee shop is going to save the world…"

Blackadder turned to Rimmer, a quizzical look doing its best to hide behind his small beard. "Saving the world? Why would I want to save the world?"

"Well, your officerness, I thought you said you destroyed it?"

"I also destroyed the breakfast I had this morning, it does not mean I wish to recreate it…" Blackadder strolled nonchalantly over the coffee counter… He pressed the bell…

Lister, Kryten, Cat and Baldrick wandered in behind them. "This is one neat place," said the Cat.

A small woman bustled up behind the counter. "Oh, good morning, Lord Blackadder!" She looked short-sightedly at the space ship that was taking up most of the coffee shop. It had also wrecked the ceiling, the frappuccino counter and several settees. "Is that your space ship?"

"Yes, well, there was nowhere to park outside…"

"What I can get you gentlemen? We are giving away coffee."

"Why's that?" asked Rimmer.

"The Earth's in the middle of being eaten at the moment. They started off in Australia, but nobody here noticed until 'Neighbours' and 'Home and Away' stopped and then most people were curiously happy."

"Balders?"

"Yes, Milord?"

"You know I asked you to set the time co-ordinates?"

"Yes, Milord?"

"Did you set them to before you released those Earth eating Gelfs or after?"

The front of the coffee house disappeared in the maw of a huge, hairy, practically invincible Earth eating gelf, which despite all this was curiously cute.

"I can't remember, my Lord…" Baldrick's look softened as he looked at the Gelf. "Oh, that's Fred! I remember him, friendly little chap; I mean he didn't mean to eat that fleet of Space Corp Destroyers… They annoyed him by flying very quickly in the opposite direction to the one he was going in."

"One coffee to go, please, Mrs Miggins!" said Blackadder. He then looked curiously about as she ran out the door and right into the mouth of Fred's friend, George.

"Well, I hate to leave in the middle of a coffee…" said Blackadder.

"Better the middle of a coffee than the middle of a gelf," said Rimmer. He was so shocked he forgot to add 'your officerness' at the end. He was also running very quickly back into Starbug.

"Sorry about the coffee shop and the Earth," said Blackadder to the disappearing feet of Mrs Miggins. Her feet were not disappearing in a magical sense but more in a being eaten sense by a huge ravening monster sense.

Blackadder scampered back into the Starbug and pressed the time jump button just before the entire coffee shop got eaten…

The Starbug winked into existence next to the space station just a few short hours from when Blackadder and Baldrick would begin their three million year sleep and the Earth would be eaten.

Blackadder had called the crew into the cockpit of the Starbug.

"Right, crew, what we have to do is stop the past Baldrick," at this Baldrick raised an arm, "from releasing these gelfs. We need someone with style, authority and panache to go in and sort this out…" He raised an eyebrow. "Normally this would mean me, but I'm already on board the station, or at least my past self is."

Rimmer coughed.

"So we need someone with Space Corp experience who could pass as an Admiral…"

Rimmer coughed again, but louder.

"Someone who knows the Space Corp system inside out…"

Rimmer was going a strange shade of purple as he carried on coughing.

"Someone intelligent, brave and fearless who doesn't mind being eaten…"

Rimmer stopped coughing and immediately pointed to Lister.

"Okay, Rimmer, the job is yours," said Blackadder. "Just try and control that cough of yours…"

"I would be honoured to accept the assignment, your beardedness," said Rimmer. "But much as I would love to face all that unknown danger…"

"The danger's not unknown, is it, Balders?"

"Oh no, sir! I know Fred, Neville and Keith quite well!" Balders peered out of the window of the ship. Strapped to the side of the Space Station was a huge cage with pulsating energy bars. These flared up every few seconds as the huge gelfs kept trying to escape. "That chap over there…" Balders pointed to one of them.

"The one who is busy eating the asteroid the Space Corp just dropped in?"

"Yep, he is Neville," said Baldrick. "You see that huge bit of metal round his neck?"

"Yep…"

"That was the Space Corp Destroyer Hermes. Nev caught it and wrapped it around his neck as a prize; that was when they annoyed him by feeding him."

"And you want me to stop them escaping?" said Rimmer.

"Should be simple enough," said Blackadder. "Holly?"

"Yep."

"Give Rimmer the dress uniform of a four star Space Corp Admiral."

"What do I look like? A tailor?"

"No, you look like a computer on his last chance before I reprogram you with a soldering iron, a screwdriver and a four kiloton nuclear bomb."

"I'll just look up the uniform, just a sec…" Holly disappeared for a few seconds.

Rimmer appeared in the dress uniform of a full Admiral of Hawaiian hula hula girls.

"Well, this is very fetching," said Rimmer. "But I don't really think that a grass skirt and coconut shells over my nipples is really the way to save the Earth…"

"Just a sec…" He disappeared again and then reappeared. "What about this?"

Rimmer looked down at his shoulders and what he was wearing, which was the dress uniform of a Roman Admiral complete with toga. "Well, at least I look like an Admiral now." Blackadder was slowly shaking his head. "However this uniform was old fashioned when Caesar said 'I'm sick of eating laurels as a salad, I'll wear them on my head instead'. Get me a proper uniform!"

"Baldrick!" said Blackadder. "Fetch me my programming guide for villainous psychopaths, and a small nuclear bomb."

"Right away, sir!"

"Just a minute! Just a minute!" said Holly. "There, what about that?"

Rimmer was weighed down under the weight of the epaulettes. "Perfect, Holly, perfect!"

Rimmer turned to Blackadder. "Are you absolutely sure I'm best for this job, your officerness?"

"Well," said Blackadder. "It's either you, an automated toilet brush, a man who has yet to be admitted to the human race, or a man descended from cats. All you have to do is stop those creatures escaping."

Rimmer looked out at the window at the huge beasts now safely caged. He then looked down at his shoulders. He was an officer! And more than just an officer, an Admiral!

"I'll do it, sir!"

"Excellent," said Blackadder. "Open a coms channel to the station, Balders."

"Errrhhh…"

"Radio contact. Start radio contact."

"Errrmmm…" Baldrick looked over at the controls.

"Press the button, the blue button."

"What colour's blue?"

"It's that circular button there!"

"What's a circle?"

"That one! That one!" Blackadder pointed at the blue circular button with the label on it saying 'Comms channel'.

"Oh, right," said Baldrick with unfounded confidence as he pressed the button next to it, which was the rocket booster. The Starbug scraped down the side of the Station with a horrendous screeching sound and some rather colourful sparks. A huge clawed hand came out of the side of the cage and tore off one of their fins. This was dragged back and eaten by a happy looking Neville.

"No, this one! This one!" said Blackadder and pressed the button himself.

"Space Station 456. This is a message to the JMC Starbug that is currently trying to dock with us with the ineptitude of a hippo trying to dance the waltz."

"Errrmmm, yes?" said Rimmer, standing next to the speaker.

"STOP WRECKING MY STATION!"

"Yes sir, sorry sir," said Rimmer, wincing slightly.

"You are an Admiral," mouthed Blackadder. "Nobody shouts at you!"

"Oh yes, I'm an Admiral by the way! Would you kindly move your Space Station when I'm trying to park this ship!"

"You dock, not park," said Blackadder.

"Sorry, dock!"

"Sorry, your Admiralness," came the voice crackling through the communicator. "We'll open up hangar one for you. Please steer the ship towards the…"

Rimmer coughed.

"I mean we'll move this huge ten mile wide, 500 billion tonne Space Station just for you, sir. You just stay still, sir…"

Various rocket jets around the station fired up as they expertly manoeuvred the station round the Starbug.

"Okay, Rimmer. We'll stay in touch via this radio receiver attached to your hat," said Blackadder, as the door hissed open and the staircase elongated out. "You have two hours to save the world…"


	4. Admiral Rimmer

Red Dwarf characters owned by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor and Blackadder characters by Richard Grant and Ben Elton. With thanks to Cmar for beta reading this for me! Also thanks to Sunrise of the tango factory, Cazflibs, Cmar and Radar-fox for the reviews so far! All very much appreciated! All reviews welcome!

**Chapter Four – The Red Adder**

Rimmer tottered down the steps of Starbug, his eyes ablaze with power! An officer! His eyes vaguely ran over the line of officers that were lining up either side of the Starbug.

"Good morning Admiral," said an officer with a moustache so long you could probably plait it. He held out a hand to shake Rimmer's.

Rimmer ignored it. "And you are?"

"Sorry sir, Commodore of the Fleet, Mornington, sir." He held out his hand again.

Rimmer ignored it again, his eyes glowing with power. What to say? Something suitably officerlike? "Put that hand away, we're not playing pat-a-cake." Brilliant! Subtle and witty and just brilliant!

"Sorry, your officerness."

Rimmer stalked majestically towards the main entranceway, ignoring the officers saluting him as he passed. A couple of people who looked vaguely familiar hid behind some of the officers.

"Excuse me, sir!" said the Commodore as he scampered behind him. "I know I should know and I feel guilty for not, but…"

Rimmer stopped and glared steely-eyed at him. "What is it, Borington?"

"I couldn't have your name, please, sir? Your eminence, I mean?"

"My name?" Rimmer's mind had been filled with reams of instructions. He would paint the entire fleet battleship grey as opposed to military grey. He would rename all the ships to RSCV (Rimmer Space Corp Vessel). He would… His name?

"Rimmer. Admiral Rimmer!"

"I thought I recognised that stately chin, sir…"

"What is it, Fornington?"

"We've got one of your brothers here, sir. Howard Rimmer. He's not done as well as you, sir, though. He is a mere test pilot, sir."

Seeing Howard as an Admiral! "Bring him to me."

"Certainly sir, certainly sir." Mornington gave a crisp salute and an about turn.

Sloppy salute. "Mornington?"

"Your worshipfulness?"

"Your salute is appalling! I've seen diseased lemmings give a better salute than that. As of now the Space Corp salute is as follows." Rimmer showed them the full double Rimmer salute. The one with both arms doing the five circles, paying homage to the five Space Corp sections. The full salute that takes five minutes to complete.

"I'm terribly sorry, sir, we did not learn that at Space Corp College."

Rimmer jabbed him in the chest with his finger. "You officers are all soft!"

"We've been through the Space Corp Survivorship week! We are not soft!"

"What was the survivorship week? Eating worms and living off haggis in Scotland?"

"Not quite, sir."

"What then?"

"We had to survive Henley Regatta, with just two changes of dinner jacket and just five hundred dollar-pounds between two of us." He shuddered. "It was horrendous - we ran out of champagne and caviar at 11:30 and we were reduced to drinking pims." He grabbed Rimmer by the lapels. "I still have the flashbacks!"

Rimmer pushed him back. "We need to toughen you up! Call all the officers to the deck now!"

* * *

Back in Starbug, Blackadder was anxiously looking at his watch. "What is that idiot up to? He should be making his way to stop Balders!"

He peered out of the window. He could see the Gelfs gnashing their teeth and struggling to escape their bars.

Soon Baldrick would, in a misguided attempt to help them, release the beasts.

* * *

Row upon row of officers peered up at him from the auditorium. This was power! This was it! The cream of the Space Corp hanging on every word he said. He could make a change now! He could! Himself on his own! Every word he said now would whisper through the ages. No, not whisper! Shout! His words would be used in every textbook from now to the next 10,000 years!

"Whibble, marzipan, heliotrope." Bugger! I've forgotten how to speak! "I mean ladies and gentlemen." He'd got their attention, excellent! Now what did my book on public speaking say?

Don't keep your hands in your pockets. Use hand gestures. Right!

"The Space Corp is decadent!" He gave a karate chop with this and hit the desk. "Ouch!" He gave a few non-officer-like swear words. "It is corrupt!" He waved his arms like a windmill. That's better, it has their attention. "Like the Tower of Babel, it is an edifice built on the dreams of men!"

An officer put his hand up at this. "Errr, excuse me sir?"

Rimmer pointed. "Balding, fat, sweaty man. Do you need the toilet?"

"Err, no sir, I…"

"I what? Speak up! Is that gum you're chewing?"

"No sir, I would…"

"Well, I hope you brought enough for everyone."

"I'm not chewing anything! You see…"

"What do you need advice on, your sweaty smelly problems? Have you tried bathing, deodorant or washing your clothes more than every millennium?"

"I'm not smelly! It's not that I need advice on, it's…"

"Your grey hair?"

"I'm not going grey, it's the way the light reflects off my hair."

"What's left of it. Is it your weight problem?"

"I'm not fat!"

"Bad dress sense? Halitosis? Bad teeth?"

"No, it's nothing like that!"

"Speak up then, I haven't got all day."

"How is the Space Corp like a biblical tower?"

"There's always one, isn't there? You see these lapels?" asked Rimmer, pointing to his Admiral's epaulettes.

"The ones with dandruff on?"

"Yes! I mean no - I mean yes!" He started jabbing at them. "What these mean is that I'm right and you're wrong!"

"Right, sir. Right. I still don't get it though, sir?"

* * *

Blackadder was listening intently to what was going on.

"What's he doing?" asked Lister.

"Talking."

"Oh god!"

"So he isn't saving the human race then?"

"Not as such, no."

"Bugger."

* * *

Rimmer fixed them with what he thought was a steely glare. Although to be honest, if his glare could be compared to metal it would rusting, slightly battered, and probably be wrapped round a Ford Escort with a bad paint job and the imprints of several lamp posts in the bonnet. In essence his glare wouldn't scare the winner of the Round Britain, being scared at the stupidest thing like a sponge, Mr Scared competition. Incidentally the last person to win that didn't make it to the podium since he had a heart attack when he saw the ribbon flutter in the breeze.

Giggling started up in the back of the auditorium. He was losing them! What to do? What to do? More gestures and more shouting, that was what was needed.

"We will fight them on the beaches, we will fight them on the streets!"

"Excuse me again, sir?"

Rimmer pointed again. "Tall thin man desperately hiding his bald head under an appallingly bad wig."

"Yes, that's me, sir."

"What? What?"

"Who are we fighting, sir?"

"Who are we fighting?" Rimmer shook his head at such naivety. "Who are we fighting? The gelfs! The gelfs! I've got to stop the GELFS!" Rimmer ran like an idiot (something he was supremely qualified for) towards the door. "I've got to save the Earth! I've got to save the Earth!"

A handsome man with foppish hair and an easy smile walked in front of the door. "Arnold, is that you?"

"My god! Howard Rimmer! You're… You're…"

"A test pilot, I know. I haven't heard from you in years." He looked Rimmer up and down, taking in the epaulettes, Admiral's hat and the slightly pop-eyed look of panic he had. "I didn't realise you were an Admiral! Last I heard, you were cleaning chicken soup machines on the Red Dwarf."

"Cleaning and filling!" said Rimmer, tapping himself on the chest with each word. "Big difference! Big difference!"

"They don't make you an Admiral for that, do they?"

A tiny voice inside his head told him to shut the smeg up, get in the lift and stop the past Baldrick from wiping out the Earth. He ignored it. This was far more important. He had to get one up on smug-grinned, git-faced brother Howard! "I was working undercover in the Space Corp. I wouldn't expect square-jawed chumps like you to understand."

"Why did you never tell me, or Father, or even Mother?" He swept his perfect hair back from his forehead. "We all had you down as a fearful idiot. I don't half feel a fool now, Arnie. What were you doing?"

This was a chance to lord over his brother. Years of feeling inferior to his masterful brother boiled to the surface. The chance to revenge himself for that time he hid Teddy from him for TWO HOURS! All he needed was a good excuse as to what he had been doing for the past ten years. "I was working undercover, digging out sloth and indolence in the catering cleaning section of Space Corp."

"For five years? You were working undercover as a chicken soup repairman for five years!"

"Well, ten years actually."

"And all the time you were an Admiral!"

"Well, yes."

"An Admiral cleaning out chicken soup machines?"

"Well, yes." Rimmer looked around him worriedly. Officers were starting to stare at him quizzically. He had to finish this conversation quickly!

"Doesn't that strike you as slightly…" Now Rimmer, it has to be said, had never actually hit anyone before. Not from any great sense of social justice or a noble moralistic code but because he was scared he would be hit back. However that punch he threw was a real belter. Howard went flying back into some chairs and was out cold. The other officers were looking at him in bewilderment.

"I won't tolerate insubordination, from anyone," he said. "Even from my own brother."

The officers started cheering him. "That's what the Space Corp needs, a strong Admiral!"

Rimmer looked at his watch. Smeg! He had less than ten minutes to save the Earth. He ran to the lift at the end of the corridor. Where the smeg was he to go from here?

He looked keenly at the buttons in the lift. Where was it? Where was it?

There it was! Gelf Research Floor!

His finger launched towards the button when a shapely hand blocked his finger.

"Get out of my way!"

"I'm sorry," came a husky feminine voice. He felt a hand touch his epauletted shoulder. "Admiral."

"Well I should think so, I…" The very air around him seemed electrified. His eyes took in her long legs, her slender body, her beautiful face framed by a big black beard you could lose a family of badgers in. "Eeeep!"

"Sorry, I had an accident in the genetics lab. Well, I say an accident; if I catch those two they will have an accident involving me, a spanner, and ten pounds of semtex! Have you seen them? One smelly with a furry hat, and the other dressed like a model. Anyway I need to go to hospital now!"

"Accident, what accident?"

"You don't notice anything wrong with me?" She pointed her fingers at her beard.

Previously unfound gentlemanly instincts fought their way to the front of his brain. Well, to be fair, they didn't exactly fight since the rest of his brain was gaping at her huge beard. "Not at all, not at all. I thought it was a fashion statement."

"What?"

"Your…" His fingers flailed ineffectually in front of him. He must not say beard! "Legs. They are very nice and leg like."

She looked at him curiously through a gap in her beard which seemed to be growing as he looked. "Legs? A fashion statement?"

"Yes." His smile was becoming so fixed you could put it in the Tate gallery. Although a picture of Rimmer in the Tate gallery would be put in the basement, behind a filing cabinet and in a room sealed with concrete and then dropped in the Thames and set on fire. Must change the subject! Anything apart from her beard! "So does big facial growth run in your family, then?"

Now, it was fortunate for Rimmer that she was not the daughter of Superman or any of the other 'pants on the outside' brigade with heat vision or ice vision or any of the other super powers. Incidentally, there are not enough stories written about such heroes such as Wallpaper Man (he can wallpaper a room in under four hours) and Kettle Man (he can put the kettle on a mere ten minutes after first thinking about it). Had she been one of the more major heroes, then her vision would have atomised Rimmer and probably created a hole the size of Everest through the Moon.

She grabbed him by one hand and lifted him off the floor. "It was an accident, and if I catch the person responsible I will punch him again! Get that into your thick Admiral's head!"

"Yes ma'am! Accident! Sorry ma'am! No mention will be made of your beard from now on ma'am!"

"I need to get to the hospital deck without being seen!"

"Yes ma'am!" He looked at his watch and eeped. Less than two minutes to go before the Gelfs escaped and destroyed the Earth! How to get out of here? He then thought: he was an Admiral for smegs sake!

"I order you to take me to the Gelf Research deck!"

Her jaw dropped. He was comparing her to a Gelf now! Was this the rudest most insensitive man ever? While her brain was still mulling over the list she carried of rude insensitive pigs, her fist didn't bother thinking and just hit Rimmer square on the chin.


	5. Lister and Cat's story

Red Dwarf characters owned by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor and Blackadder characters by Richard Grant and Ben Elton. With thanks to Cmar for beta reading this for me! Also thanks to Sunriseover the tango factory, Cazflibs, Cmar and Radar-fox for the reviews so far! All very much appreciated! All reviews welcome!

**Chapter Five – The Red Adder**

Rimmer groaned and woke up. His head felt like a small but very industrious mole was trying to tunnel out of it.

"What happened?"

"We were going to ask you the same question," said Blackadder.

"The Earth?"

"Currently being eaten; they have saved the moon for desert and are currently multiplying at such a rate that they will have eaten the solar system in about four hours."

"Oh dear," said Rimmer, getting to his feet. "How did you get me out?"

"Kryters sneaked in and rescued you in all the kerfuffle of the Gelfs eating everything outside the space station. We need another plan." Blackadder turned to the controls of the Starbug and expertly pressed a few buttons on the console.

With a shimmer the Starbug returned back in time to just before Rimmer had gone on board the space station.

"Okay, we need a different approach this time. Now obviously myself and Balders can't go on board since we are already there. Rimmer can't go because he's on board as well, so it just leaves Lister, Cat and Kryten." Blackadder looked over at Kryten. "Kryten, you are our backup. Lister and Cat, you will sneak on board and stop Balders releasing those Gelfs."

"Okay, Skip," said Lister, slouching past.

Blackadder fixed him with a beady eye as he passed. "Don't mess this up! Also, if you bump into your past selves or the old Rimmer, you could cause a chain reaction that could end the universe!"

Lister shrugged. "We don't want to meet the new Rimmer, let alone the old one; what's new? It's me! Hero of the hour! What could possibly go wrong?"

"Well, sir," said Kryten. "You could accidentally blow up the universe. You could release the gelfs early and doom the galaxy to being eaten. You could set up a clown college. You could…"

"It's a retorrytikal… A retook… A made up question, Kryters. Chill. We're the posse! Come on, Cat."

"If this eats into my preening time, I am so out of there!"

The Starbug sneaked next to the space station. A walkway elongated out from the side of the station and attached itself to the Starbug with a loud hollow clang.

Lister and the Cat crept on board. Lister rolled into the space station like the hero he wasn't. The Cat just strolled elegantly in. There was no way he would roll in on the dusty floor. It would so ruin his hair!

Cat hit his communicator. "Cat to Budski Adder, we are in!"

"I know, I know, I can see you."

The Cat turned around and could see Blackadder waving him on through the porthole.

"Hey Buddy, it's you!" he warbled. "Does my hair look okay to you? I mean, is this the kind of look heroes have nowadays?"

"Cat?"

"Buddy?"

"Shut up! Okay you two, don't mess this up! I can't believe I am having to trust someone who would have to take an exam to reach the level of simple."

"He's talking to you," said Cat to Lister.

"Right; come on Cat, let's go! Let's go!" said Lister, pushing him on. The Cat had caught sight of his reflection in the porthole and paused to admire it. "Move! Move!"

"Where we going, hamster face?"

"The Gelf deck! Move! Move!"

An officer came rushing past them. "What the devil are you two doing here?"

"We're just…" Lister searched for a word he had not used in years. "Working?"

"Well, get a move on, chaps, Admiral Rimmer is about to address the station."

"Rimmer? Goal post head?" said Cat. "We just left him in the green insect one!"

"Yeah, it must be his past self."

"Come on, chaps," said the officer, moving them along. "Chivvy along! It's not often we have a chance to see such an officer!"

"We'll just go in this direction…"

The officer got out a gun. "Insurrection, right! You follow me or I'll have you shot!"

"Insurr whatty, buddy?" said the Cat.

"Okay, okay," said Lister. "Come on, Cat."

They walked into a vast hall containing hundreds of Space Corp personnel. And there at the front, to their astonishment, was Arnold Rimmer. Addressing everyone! The officer they were with looked at Rimmer with adoration and they crept past him.

They sneaked out the back while all this was going on. Lister could swear that Rimmer spotted them out of the corner of his eye but he was too busy giving a speech and waving his arms like a mad semaphore man on acid.

"Where are we off to, bud?"

"The Genetically Engineering deck or something?" Lister pushed Cat in front of him. "Come on, into the lift! Move, move! How did I get partnered with you?"

The lift pinged and there in front of them was a vision of loveliness. Well, to be more realistic, it was a young woman in a tight dress, depending on your viewpoint. The viewpoint, according to Lister and the Cat, was as if the universe had suddenly stilled and all there was - was her.

"Where to, boys?"

Lister had trouble finding his voice that seemed to have hidden behind his libido. "The Genetic Engineered whatsit deck."

"That's a classified deck, can I see your clearance?"

Lister smirked. "You wanna see my clearance already? Wow, you are a fast mover!"

"Your pass, dingleberry breath."

"You look great," said the Cat to her. "I love your dress, it's very couture meets street. What's the material?"

She smiled. "Thank you. It's satin."

"It looks lovely, I've thirty-seven suits made of satin. Don't you find ironing it is a real pain? I used to lick my clothes clean but I find dry cleaning far better."

"You used to lick your clothes clean?"

"It's a biological wash."

"Cat?" said Lister.

"Yes?"

"Shut up."

"So why do you two need to visit the Gelf deck?"

The Cat started, "We've gotta save the world from these weird hairy beasties."

"What?"

"He means," said Lister, elbowing him none too gently in the ribs, "we are researching Gelfs."

"So you're scientists?"

"Nope," said Cat.

"Yes!" insisted Lister. "Scientists." He jabbed himself on the chest with each word. "That's us, scientists."

"So where's your pass?"

"We, err, experimented on it?" said Lister, wincing slightly with each unbelievable word.

"Okay," she said, looking at the two, taking in the curry stains on Lister and the paunch that told of too much food and not enough exercise. "Well, I'd best escort you." She pressed the lift button and it started clanking and whirring towards the Gelf Research deck. "So what are you two researching?"

"We are researching Dopiaz, Dhansak, Jalfrezi and Biriyani curries and their long term effects on the human digestive system."

The Cat waved his hand in front of his nose. "Not good."

A pinging noise came from the lift and the door slid open. In front of them was the Gelf Research deck. Scientists and technicians were running about with clip boards looking busy. Several cages in the deck itself held a number of Gelfs. Not as huge as the ones tethered to the space station outside but with enough teeth to give a dentist nightmares.

"Keep an eye out for Baldrick," whispered Lister to the Cat. "We've got to stop him."

The woman stopped in front of a lab desk. There was a genetic manipulation device, a microscope and even though this was the 23rd century, a Bunsen burner and one of those glass tubes that look like they are the result of a hiccupping mad glass blower. It is just something all scientists have. They might be researching the sex lives of the Guatemalan fruit fly and the effect potato growing in Skegness had on it in the 14th century (not much, curiously) but unless they have a mass of glass tubes on their desk and a Bunsen burner no-one will take them seriously.

"Okay, scientists," she said, folding her arms and looking slightly smug. "Show me your research."

Lister looked over this mass of electronics and glass and his eyebrows nearly met in the middle.

The Cat shimmied over to the table. "Hey babe, I'll show you how cats research." With unfounded confidence he started pressing buttons on the console and moving the Bunsen burner under the one of the glass tubes. He then started to pour little bits of chemical into various parts of the experiment.

As anyone who as ever turned themselves successfully blue in chemistry lessons or caused the evacuation of the science block by creating a strange jelly beast, moving Bunsen burners under glass tubes and adding in chemicals is a recipe for disaster.

"What are you doing?" she asked, walking closer to the Cat.

Lister, looking slightly worried, started to lower himself behind the table. Several other scientists saw what was going on and started to scamper towards the lift.

"I'm just adding this in, Missy!" The Cat poured a small vial of Tetrajfkdja Bicarmobate into the mix. The lid of the vial fell to the floor and the Cat ducked down to pick it up.

As soon as she leant over the table to look at what was happening - the chemicals, for want of a better word, glooped. What this means is that they splattered over anyone who was in the area. This happened to be her.

"Aaaaaah!" She screamed and put her hand to her face. "What is…"

Lister looked over at her. Her face started sprouting hair.

"You look fine, you look fine!" Lister grabbed the Cat and started pulling him towards where the Gelfs were tethered.

She looked at her reflection in one of the test tubes. "I'm growing a beard! You've made me grow a beard!"

"The macho look is in now! Come on, let's go!"

"You've given me a beard!"

"No need to thank us!" said the Cat. Lister grabbed him and they both ran, a bearded lady in hot pursuit.

"Come back here while I kill you!"

"Into the lift, come on, Cat!"

With seconds to spare they both slid into the lift. They frantically pressed a button. Anywhere! They just needed to escape!

The lift started heading up, clanking noisily as it went. There was a ping sound and the lift started heading back where they had come from.

"Oh smeg!"

Lister looked about wildly. There, against all hope, was a maintenance hatch above them. The Cat leapt towards it, his feline enhanced skills giving him the extra boost. In seconds he had clambered in. He then lowered himself down and grabbed hold of Lister. He closed the grill beneath him.

The lift door pinged open on another floor. Lister looked through the grill and could see Baldrick walking in, the past one.

"That's who we've got to stop!" hissed Lister. Lister just started to open the maintenance hatch when the door pinged open again. It was her! The bearded lady! He quickly shut it again.

"You!" she said imperiously to Baldrick. "Have you seen two men? One smelly, ugly one and one who looks like a finalist for Come Dancing?"

"That's not fair," hissed Lister to the Cat. "You're not that smelly!"

"Why?" asked Baldrick.

"Because I'm going to kill them!"

"No, is this the floor to the Gelfs?"

"Yes, but everyone's just evacuated that floor due to my beard incident."

Baldrick smiled. "That's fine then, I won't be disturbed. Love the beard by the way; my last girlfriend had a beard like that. They still let me visit her in London Zoo." The lift pinged open. "I won't be long." Baldrick walked out of the lift to the Gelf floor. The lift carried on its journey.

Lister slapped himself on the head; it didn't have much effect so he slapped the Cat instead. That made him feel a lot better. Baldrick was going to release the Gelfs and they were stuck on top of the lift with a mad bearded woman inside it! And they had helped him do it!

The lift trundled down a couple of floors and then a slightly pop-eyed Admiral Rimmer scampered on.

"If Rimmer sees us we could blow up the universe!" said Lister to the Cat.

"I wasn't that attached to it anyway," said Cat, levering at the hatch. Lister pushed him off it.

"Stop it!"

They listened into the conversation. Rimmer had a short chat with her which ended with her flattening him with a great right hook.

"I've been wanting to do that for years," hissed the Cat reverently. "She's my kind of woman!"

"She's got a four foot beard!" hissed Lister.

"Stop it, you're turning me on! For Cats beards are a thing of beauty!"

"Remind me not to shave near you in future," said Lister.

She then got out on the hospital deck and Lister and the Cat lowered themselves carefully down into the lift next to the comatose Rimmer.

"Right, let's go up to the…"

Klaxons erupted around the space station as the Gelfs were given their freedom by Baldrick.

"Smeg!"


	6. Kryten's story

Red Dwarf characters owned by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor and Blackadder characters by Richard Grant and Ben Elton.

With thanks to Cmar for beta reading this for me!

Also thanks to Sunrise over the tango factory, Cazflibs, Cmar, Radar-fox and Cyborg-Garfield for the reviews so far! All very much appreciated! All reviews welcome

**Chapter Six – The Red Adder**

Blackadder was currently in a bit of a quandary. He wasn't too sure whether to hit Lister and the Cat with his fist or let his foot do the hard work. In the end he decided just to subject them both to a withering look.

"You did what?" he asked again. He had been listening the first time to their inane witterings but his brain had refused to believe such warblings.

Lister sucked on his lip and started again. "We kinda gave a woman a beard, got the Gelf deck evacuated and couldn't go after Baldrick because if we did she would kill us."

"She would kill you?"

"Yep."

"She had the same kinda look you've got now," said the Cat, pointing at Blackadder's face - which had a look that wouldn't just curdle milk, it would give it legs and send it back to the cow it came from.

"Brilliant, just brilliant!" said Blackadder. "We've only got one dunderhead left to send in." He looked over his shoulder. "Kryten!" he shouted. "Where's that robotic moron gone?"

Kryten's face appeared from the cockpit door. "Hello sir, I'm just cleaning all that nasty gunky oil out of the engine."

"The oil the engine needs to run?"

"I'm no engineer, sir, but I do recognise a mess when I see one."

"Kryten, take off that pink frilly hat and put the duster down, you have a chance to save humanity!" He gave his best friendliest smile; well, he was showing his teeth anyway.

He turned to the console and expertly pressed a few buttons. The ship winked out of existence in exactly the sort of way that shows they had spent all the special effects budget on bacon sandwiches and a pickled egg the evening before.

The Starbug nestled close to the Space Station. Now if this story could afford one of those expensive cameras that swoops and soars over the expensive model of a space station, and not one of those that gets caught on the string and accidentally zooms in on the chap gluing bits of silver painted egg carton to the outside, you would see several identical Starbugs next to the space station on different sides. The camera zooms in through the window of one of the Starbugs to see a rare sight.

"Right, Kryters," said Blackadder, a friendly arm round his shoulders. For Blackadder a friendly arm was one that wasn't hitting you. You've got more chance of seeing Elvis knock on your door at 2 am with the winning lottery ticket than seeing this again, so concentrate. "All you have to do is avoid Lister, the Cat and Rimmer and stop the past Baldrick from releasing those Gelfs. Remember, if you bump into the past selves of Rimmer, Lister or the Cat there is a chance the universe could implode."

"Say hi to Neville if you see him," said Baldrick.

"Which one's Neville, sir?"

"He's the Gelf with the broken tooth." He smiled and shook his head in happy memories. "He broke it when he was chewing that nuclear missile and it blew up in his mouth. Just because he ate something he shouldn't have."

"What was that?"

"I think it was the Space Station Minerva and three battalions of Space Marines. The little tyke! They annoyed him by breathing. I mean he's only human! Well, not really human, more a huge armour-plated indestructible Gelf, but close enough."

"Off you toddle," said Blackadder, miming a walking motion with one hand.

The door hissed open and Kryten waddled down the walkway to the space station. His anxiety chip was overheating and giving him strange error messages.

"5346540 – Unknown error. This error is unknown and is caused by something that is unknown and is causing unknown problems. Troubleshooting – see ref 544064.5466a."

He quickly flipped through his internal troubleshooting charts.

"544064.5466a – Recommended action. Unknown. If you find the solution to this problem please e-mail the helpdesk so we can help you in future."

He shut it down and the overheating anxiety chip cooled down, but that caused his worry chip to start sending lots of strange messages to his CPU. He tried to ignore them and carried on waddling down the corridor.

What was he doing here?

He was a cleaning droid! He wasn't one of those hero droids he watched on the ship's vid when the others had gone to sleep and he had finished his cleaning duties. Not like Arnold Schwargnut&bolt4564. He was forever fighting evil IT departments who wanted to dismantle him and upgrade him with the latest model. He would know what to do! Normally after he had bravely lost his arm and had spent half the film screwing it back in.

An officer walked past; he had a small moustache and looked as if he had some ferret in his ancestry. "You! What are you doing?"

He had to keep walking. He had to save the Earth, but his programming got the better of him.

I can't tell him the truth? But I can't lie!

Yes, you can! You've done it before, you can do it again!

"I'm just off to marzipan to count my meringues."

The officer shot him a strange look. "Are your audio circuits malfunctioning?"

One lie was too much. His honesty chip was turning blue with heat. "No sir."

"Good. Someone has spilt red wine in the officers' mess. Clear it up, please. Quick as you can."

"Certainly, sir." He stood still.

The officer was staring at him curiously. "Well?"

"Where is it, please sir?"

"Deck 45. Room 54. Move. We might be showing Admiral Rimmer around shortly and we cannot have mess. I'll show you where it is; follow me."

Kryten was in a quandary. He had to save the Earth! But here he was being given an order.

It was only red wine.

It wouldn't take long.

He bustled happily along the corridor, trailing behind the officer. This was more his kind of job! He wasn't like Schwargnut&bolt4564, he wasn't a hero.

Cleaning though!

That was him alright. He quickly accessed his data files. Red wine stains.

"Red wine stains – First of all ascertain it is red wine by tasting it. It is recommended that you drink several bottles of red wine to make sure. After this you won't worry about the red wine stain or even be able to see it."

If Kryten had a heart it would have sunk. Lister had got hold of his files one night when he was in down time, and as he said it, "changed 'em since it's a giggle, isn't it, and you shouldn't be so tied to the system."

He cursed in machine code (roughly translated:

10 Print "Git!"

20 GoTo 10. )

He had first noticed it last week when Rimmer had asked him why he was trying to clean the fridge with Chicken Vindaloo.

Damn his programming!

Kryten followed the officer. "Bit of luck I found you actually. We were getting in a fearful tis about this."

Kryten's anxiety chip started to cool down. Even without instructions it should be easy enough to clean up a wine stain. It wouldn't take long, would it?

The door hissed open in front of them and there was Baldrick, the past one, the one he had to stop rescuing the Gelfs! He was industriously pouring various liquids on the stain to make it go.

"What the devil are you doing?" asked the officer.

"Well, Captain Darling, Commander the Lord Blackadder asked me to get rid of this wine stain. I then tried to get rid of the stain by pouring on white wine. That seemed to make it worse so I added ketchup to stain the whole carpet the same colour, then added a beef burger because you always have ketchup with that. Then onion rings since I…"

"Shut up! Shut up!"

Baldrick stopped talking. The only sound was the gloop of a bottle of mayo that was slowly emptying onto the carpet. Some people would pay a fortune for a carpet like that, it is the kind of thing that should be hanging up in the Tate gallery above a sign saying something like 'man's struggle with his humanity' or more realistically 'I don't understand modern art, this belongs in a skip'.

"We might be showing Admiral Rimmer this place soon, and it needs to be clean and tidy!" Captain Darling was wringing his hands together nervously. "Any ideas?"

"We could serve him the carpet as a snack?" said Baldrick. "I even added bacon, it's probably quite tasty."

This it had to be said was true. Well, it had to be true; it was currently being enjoyed by several thousand cockroaches, and we all know what finicky eaters they are.

Captain Darling paled and looked at his feet which were now a mass of insects. "Okay, if you two can clean up this mess, I'll just be off."

Kryten looked at Baldrick. Baldrick looked at Kryten.

"What we need is something to eat this carpet and these cockroaches," said Baldrick. "And quickly."

"I know," said Kryten, his CPU whirring on overtime. "Gelfs! They'll eat anything!"

Baldrick's small mousy face lit up at this. "Genius! I know just where there are some as well! You stay here; I'll go and get them! That was a great idea of yours, I would never have thought of it on my own!" Baldrick scampered to the door and opened it.

Little warning bells starting ringing in Kryten's CPU. These quickly realised they weren't being paid attention to, so they changed to klaxons. Now before you start reaching for your dictionary a klaxon is a very loud siren, and not one of those aliens that always ask Captain Kirk, "So show me how humans kiss."

Kryten stood there as if rooted to the spot. He tried to follow Baldrick and then realised he was stuck to the sticky food-covered carpet and his feet were a mass of cockroaches. This is not a nice image, so try and think of something nice like chocolate ice cream or Brighton winning the FA cup.

He had to stop Baldrick releasing those Gelfs!

With a strain of effort, he unstuck his feet from the carpet and plodded heavily towards the door. Walking on this carpet was like walking in a muddy field. Every step gives you an extra layer. By the time Kryten reached the door his head was scraping the ceiling.

The door hissed open and he staggered out. He shook the layers of food covered carpet off each foot, showering several passing officers with layers of carpet, food and insects.

Ignoring the cries of alarm behind him, he waddled furiously down the corridor towards where Baldrick had gone. The Kryten Series 4000 mechanoid is a marvel of technology, but they had only designed him to be able to outrun lime scale.

He needed speed!

He waddled past an automatic vacuum cleaner. Like one of those you see dispersing rubbish in town centres. They basically move it to the areas that voted against the council that are in.

He clambered on and pressed the throttle. It would be nice to say something like: the powerful V8 engines rocketed the vacuum cleaner to speeds unheard of in human imagination, and throw in a few words like vortex and blur, but it would be a lie. It pottered along at the kind of speed that would give a dead snail time to get out of the way.

Still, it was faster than he normally went.

Where had Baldrick gone! Who would have thought that the little man who looked like he had been out-evolved by a squashed apricot could run so fast?

With one robotic tongue sticking out the side of his mouth (this enables concentration and stops people asking you stupid questions since they are wondering why you are doing it) he headed towards the lift. But not fast enough.

Klaxons erupted around the space station as the Gelfs were given their freedom by Baldrick.


	7. Blackadder's story

Red Dwarf characters owned by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor and Blackadder characters by Richard Grant and Ben Elton.

With thanks to Cmar for beta reading this for me!

Also thanks to Sunrise over the Tango factory, Cazflibs, Cmar, Radar-fox, Cyborg-Garfield, happyhooligan2001 and Ace Trax for the reviews so far! All very much appreciated! All reviews welcome

**Chapter Seven – The Red Adder**

Blackadder felt like he was hitting his head against a wall. To be honest, for Blackadder it was a metaphorical wall; for Baldrick it was a real one.

Baldrick rubbed his head and stopped headbutting the wall. "Is that enough, sir?" he said in a weak voice.

"No, carry on." Blackadder sauntered out of the cockpit and back to the main room of the Starbug where the others were waiting. The sound of banging carried on, but getting fainter and fainter. "You're not trying enough!"

"Sorry sir!" The sound of banging carried on but louder this time.

"Right, Kryten, so basically you fouled up."

Kryten nodded.

"In fact it is of a level with the Captain of the Titanic, who said 'let's not go round this iceberg, let's go through it!'"

Kryten nodded again.

"Well, I suppose it's up to me to save the universe then." Blackadder skilfully pressed a few buttons and the Starbug winked into existence next to the Space Station. The station was now so covered in green Starbugs it looked like it had a particularly bad case of acne. "I mean, how difficult can it be to stop Balders? You cretins would be hard pressed to save a house plant, let alone a planet. If you can stay out of trouble for just a short time, I will go and save the universe. God knows why," he muttered to himself, "What's the universe ever done for me except saddle me with a bunch of half witted incompetents who've lost the only brain cell they were sharing?"

They were starting to run out of places to enter the space station so they had to choose the air conditioning.

As this was a space station, and as we all know from films it's a wonder any air travels round at all, since they are chock full of burly heroes in vests with unfeasibly large guns and nasty aliens. Blackadder was unable to carry on along the air conditioning because of a big battle going on between Mary Poppins, for some reason, and an alien (Blackadder had unwittingly wandered into another crossover, this one with Mary Poppins versus the Aliens).

"Spoon full of sugar, my bottom!" said Mary Poppins. "Eat radioactive death, alien!"

Blackadder sighed to himself. This is what happens when writers drink too much caffeine. He had to take a right turn down a garbage chute to avoid this. Now, considering that Blackadder and a sunny disposition are as likely to be seen together as the contents of the Big Brother house and sanity, he was not happy when he finally crawled his way into the station.

There was a tapping sound in the trapdoor in the kitchens and some rather inventive swearing coming from it. After a bit of helpful kicking, the door fell in and a smelly and bedraggled Blackadder saw the light.

In this case, the light was that carried by the security team that was investigating the noise. They had of course split up to do this, and the one security guard who happened to find Blackadder had just decided to ask his girlfriend to marry him just before he left.

Blackadder looked up to see a rather large gun pointing at his head.

"Don't move, pal," said the guard.

"Don't worry, he's with me," said Blackadder, pointing behind him into the blackness of the garbage chute and dusting himself off. Several banana peels and an old pack of Golden Wonder crisps fell off his head.

"Who is?" the guard said, peering into the black hole.

"You wait here for him," said Blackadder, and was just about to stroll off when another guard appeared.

"Who are you? What are you doing crawling out of the rubbish?"

"I'm Commander The Lord Blackadder of the Space Corp, who are you?"

"I'm Sergeant Neville, sir."

"Well, Neville, you should be questioning your colleague, he seems to have gone mad since he's staring into that hole." Blackadder pointed at the other guard who was staring short-sightedly into the garbage hole as he had ordered him to.

There was the sound of several dozen heavy-booted guards running round the corner. Blackadder pointed at the original guard. "Guard him! I don't want him to move!"

"Right, sir."

"You," said Blackadder, pointing at one of the other guards. "Find where Eighty-ninth Level Technician Baldrick is." He looked at his watch (they had to create a whole new subsection of Technician for Baldrick, he ranks just under a used toilet brush). "I need to know now!"

"You're an officer, aren't you sir, can't you find out?"

"I'm undercover."

"You're under rubbish," said the guard, brushing what he hoped was an apple core out of Blackadder's beard. "What's this about, sir?"

"Security check, hop to it!"

Blackadder rubbed his hands together and for once was quite happy. This was how you saved the world; you got other people to do it for you.

"Yes sir, at once, sir."

Blackadder handed him a comlink. "I want this kept top secret as well. You're not to tell anyone. When you find him report back to me on this, not on the ship's com. It is a secure channel to me only."

The security guard gave him a crisp salute. "Yes sir!"

"I'm just off to get tidied up. Carry on, sergeant."

Where would that idiot Baldrick be?

Where would a small, smelly man who was descended from dung beetles be?

Blackadder strolled nonchalantly down the corridor. First of all he needed to clean himself up. The officers' mess, they had a bathroom there! He strolled into the place. Oh no, there's Captain Darling.

"Hello Darling," said Blackadder. "What are you doing here? I thought you would be too busy counting paper clips to be here."

Darling looked at him quizzically. "How did you do that, Blackadder?"

"Do what?"

"You just walked into the kitchen over there." Darling waved a hand over at the small kitchenette in the corner from which could be heard somebody hitting Baldrick. Or to be more specific, someone who sounded like Blackadder. Or to be precise, it _was_ Blackadder, the past one.

It was his past self! If he bumped into him he could end it all; the universe could implode.

He needed a distraction! He grabbed a wine glass from the side and tripped up, spilling red wine on the carpet in front of Darling. "Clumsy me! I'll just get a cloth! Bye!" Blackadder scooted out of the room quickly.

Seconds later, the past Blackadder walked into the room followed by Baldrick. Captain Darling was looking even more confused than before. "You just spilt wine on the carpet and walked out that door!"

Blackadder looked at Darling quizzically. "Should I talk to the nurse about doubling your pills again?"

"I don't take any pills!"

"Well, it's high time you started."

The tannoy blared out. "Admiral Rimmer has entered the station. He might be inspecting the base. Everywhere must be clean and tidy!"

"Bugger." Blackadder looked down at the red stain on the white carpet. "Sort it out, Balders, I'm off."

"Certainly, sir." Baldrick looked at the carpet. It was only a small red stain, should be easy to sort out. I mean, what's the worst that can happen?

The current Blackadder scampered out of the Officer's Mess. Must hide! Must hide!

He could just see his past self leave the room, so he opened the first door he found. It swished open and swished shut behind him. It is a physical impossibility to ever hide from someone in a film or a book by opening a door and walking into an empty room. If it is a fifties or sixties film it would have a lecture in it for them to try to fake, a seventies film - a porn film in the making, an eighties film - half a dozen terrorists to fight, a nineties film would be empty apart from an egg whisk with which to fight the aliens.

Blackadder looked behind him cautiously to see General Melchett. He was in the command centre of the space station. It was a huge room filled with technicians looking at screens and pressing buttons. Melchett was looking quizzically at a screen that was showing Admiral Rimmer walking onto the base.

Melchett was looking stressed. His moustache was twitching like a mouse on acid. He turned around to look at Blackadder. "Hello Blackadder, wasn't expecting to see you here." He pointed a finger at the screen. "Do you know who this chap is? The only Arnold Rimmer we have on files is currently degunking chicken soup machines on a Space Corp mining vessel."

"Yes, he's a very important Admiral, very important. Indeed. Yes. He's the most importanist man in history," said Blackadder, floundering. A flounder is a small brown fish with goggly eyes, and curiously, Blackadder's face was very similar to this now.

The screen above showing Rimmer dissolved, and a huge disembodied head of a fat man with glasses appeared. "Oi mush," said Pete the Base Computer.

"What?" said Melchett, looking up.

"Yeah mush. You, Faucet or whatever you're called?"

"It's Melchett. You're a computer with an IQ of 12,000, how can you forget what I'm called?" asked Melchett.

"Whatever. My sensors are picking up weirdness."

"What do you mean, weirdness?"

Blackadder was backing out slowly. "Well, I'd best be off to see Admiral Rimmer!" Blackadder pointed at the door. "You know, welcome him aboard sort of thing!"

"Weirdness, you know, something odd, strange, bizarre. I'm detecting duplicate people aboard and some people who shouldn't be aboard at all!"

"What the devil do you mean? This is not one of those jokes, is it? Like that time you told me clothes were banned and I walked into the meeting of the Space Corp Executive totally naked with a sign round my neck saying John Thomas?"

The pixelised man giggled at this. "No, not like that. There are duplicate people about."

"Duplicate people? What do you mean, copies? Who?"

"Like him," said Pete, nodding towards Blackadder who was slinking towards the door. "Beardy sarcastic bloke. Slackdagger or whatever his name is, there's more than one of him. And I've got a few people on the sensors who should be on Red Dwarf, although the Dwarf has just started accelerating as there has been an accident on board, so god knows how they got here. There is also a contingent of guards who should be on the Gelf deck keeping the Gelfs in check and they are guarding a rubbish chute for some reason. They say Commander Blackadder ordered them to do it."

Pete cocked his head to one side whilst he concentrated on something. "The Gelf deck has just been evacuated due to a minor beard-related incident. There is no-one guarding the Gelfs. Slackbladder has just prepared the way for a possible disaster of Earth-eating proportions."

"What do you mean?" asked Melchett.

"If those Gelfs escape, the human race will be looking for a new planet to inhabit."

"Blackadder!" roared Melchett. "You'll get stasis for this!"

"It's always stressful moving house, isn't it?" sighed Pete. "You nearly always forget something important, like a kettle, the keys, or the address you are moving to."

Blackadder scampered out of the control room. I always wondered why I got put into stasis as well as Baldrick, he thought.

Things were not going well. In fact, on the scale of things, with ten being good and one being bad, they would be on minus several million and there would be several dozen mathematicians and about forty super-computers looking for new numbers to tack on the end of the scale.

"Commander Blackadder?" His comlink buzzed.

"Yes?"

"This is the guard contingent. We have found Baldrick, sir."

"Thank god, something is going right today. Keep him there, don't let him get away!"

"Yes sir!"

Klaxons started erupting around the ship as the Gelfs were given their freedom.

"Bugger!"


	8. A cunning plan

Red Dwarf characters owned by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor and Blackadder characters by Richard Grant and Ben Elton.

With thanks to Cmar for beta reading this for me!

Also thanks to Sunrise over the Tango factory, Cazflibs, Cmar, Radar-fox, Cyborg-Garfield, happyhooligan2001 and Ace Trax for the reviews so far! All very much appreciated! All reviews welcome

**Chapter Eight – The Red Adder**

"So we're in deep doo-doo," said Baldrick to a rather bedraggled looking Blackadder.

"Yes, you could say that. We're in more trouble than a horse in a French meat factory. We've only got one person to send in before life starts getting very complicated." Blackadder raised an eyebrow at Baldrick. Baldrick stared at him blankly. He raised a second eyebrow. Still no response. This was getting serious; he nodded in Baldrick's direction.

"Who else hasn't been on board yet?" asked Baldrick, his small mousy face screwed up in concentration. If a person of Einstein's brainpower could power a continent, Baldrick's brainpower would be hard pressed to power a small fairy light.

"This isn't advanced calculus, brain surgery or even turning on a light switch, Baldrick," said Blackadder. "Everyone in this room apart from you has gone on board the Space Station to try and stop the previous you releasing the Gelfs. Note the words _apart from you_ in that sentence."

Baldrick looked round the room slowly; Kryten, the Cat and Lister were all smiling and nodding in his direction.

"Who's next then?"

The nodding and pointing got more extreme like in a world-class headbangers concert.

"Is it your turn again, Mi'lord?" Baldrick asked Blackadder.

"For god's sake no! It's your turn!" Blackadder pointed one hand at Baldrick.

Still no response.

He pointed both hands at Baldrick.

He pointed a foot as well at him. This was getting serious; he was in danger of falling down if he raised any more feet.

"Your turn! Baldrick's turn!"

Rimmer was busy scribbling something on a huge piece of paper. It had the word "Baldrick" written on it in huge letters. He held it in front of him.

Baldrick squinted at it. "Just a minute."

"Do you need your reading glasses, bud?" asked the Cat.

"No, I need to learn to read."

"Oh for God's sake!" said Blackadder, pushing him towards the airlock. He was mildly perturbed to find out it wasn't pointing to deep space but was in fact next to the space station.

"Now Balders, you have to try and stop the previous you without bumping into the previous you or the previous us, otherwise the universe could implode for some not very good reason but something to do with metaphysics. Have you got that?"

"I'm a bit hazy on some of the details."

"Like?"

"All of them!"

"Close enough!" Blackadder pushed Baldrick into the air lock.

They were seriously running out of places to enter the space station so they had to choose a sewage outlet. This crawl is particularly horrible and the writer really doesn't want to dwell on it. After some particularly revolting adventures involving a toilet and the Space Corp vomiting championship (please don't think about it, oh it's too late!) and the less said about the morning after the Space Corp Curry eating championships the better.

Baldrick emerged in the shower block. If you can imagine something like the creature from the black lagoon, you would be nowhere near. It was at least thirty times worse. The shower block quickly cleared of screaming tanned fit naked people (male or female depending on your interests!).

You can stop thinking about that now and carry on reading.

I said stop thinking about that!

Thank you!

He quickly cleaned himself down to something that did not resemble something that belonged in a sewage works and, dripping heavily, he walked out into to the corridor.

How on earth was he to stop the previous him without bumping into him?

Baldrick stopped and tried to think. Unbidden images of turnips appeared in his brain.

He shrugged; close enough. Right now, where was I going before? The Gelf deck, right, if I can stop myself going in there I can possibly save the world!

He scampered down the corridor like an overgrown mole rat (a creature rather like a fully grown Baldrick).

Where had he been before? The Officer's mess! That was it! (Curiously, before the line of Baldricks had first infested the Earth it was called the Officer's tidy.)

His memory of what happened before was pretty hazy but that was quite normal. He knew he had been put into stasis for something?

Whatever it was, he probably deserved it.

Lord Blackadder was forever hitting him for things he deserved: like breathing, walking, and causing the utter destruction of the human race.

How on earth was he meant to stop the past Baldrick when no-body else had managed it? He would be the first person to say he was slow (well, actually he would about the fifty-second). In terms of brainpower he knew he was on a par with a squashed asparagus.

Captain Darling was in the room at the moment. He needed to find somewhere to hide. From what he remembered of his Lordship saying the whole thing started off here, if he could somehow stop the past Baldrick when he was in here, he would win.

"You're Blackadder's batman, aren't you?" asked Darling imperiously.

"Yes sir." Just keep smiling at him and keep walking.

"Get me a drink."

"Yes sir." He walked over to the kitchenette and saw the fridge. There was a bottle of Highfield Pinot Noir, a rather mediocre red wine but definitely good enough for Captain Darling.

What was it his Lordship had said of Darling? He was the excrement on the dunghill of humanity, and that was without the swear words.

He quickly decorked it and poured out a glass of red wine. He took it over to Captain Darling, who was in a deep conversation with his communicator, and left it on the side.

He then started to scuttle back to the kitchenette when Lord Blackadder walked in the room, the past one.

"Baldrick? How did you get here so fast? I left you cleaning the latrines not two minutes ago!"

"Errrrm?"

"What are you doing here?"

"Getting Captain Darling a drink?"

Blackadder grabbed Baldrick by the ear and dragged him to the kitchen. "What drink did you give him? Speak quickly or I'll cover you in ketchup and onion rings and feed you to General Melchett!"

"That red wine!" Baldrick pointed at the bottle of wine he had opened.

"Did you season it before hand, perchance?"

"No!" Baldrick squealed as Blackadder hit him.

"What did I tell you about drinks and Captain Darling?"

"To only serve him the best wines?"

"Yes, and…" Blackadder's hand was hovering over his head.

"Which have passed through me first?"

"Nearly?"

"At least four times."

"Exactly." Blackadder's hand lowered down. There was the sound of Darling talking to someone in the other room, Captain Darling's cry of annoyance, then the sound of running feet and the door slamming shut.

Blackadder walked into the room, closely followed by Baldrick.

"You just spilt wine on the carpet and ran out that door!" Darling said, pointing at the door opposite him.

Blackadder looked at Darling like he was a mad weevil that had just asked for dancing lessons. "Should I talk to the nurse about doubling your pills again?"

"I don't take any pills!"

"Well, it's high time you started."

The tannoy blared out. "Admiral Rimmer has entered the station. He might be inspecting the base. Everywhere must be clean and tidy!"

"Bugger." Blackadder looked down at the red stain on the white carpet. "Sort it out, Balders, I'm off."

"Certainly, sir."

Blackadder strolled out.

"You stay here," said Darling. "I'll see about getting some help." Captain Darling scampered out as well.

Baldrick looked worriedly about the place. This was turning into a disaster of turnip eating proportions. Captain Darling had left his communicator behind on the side.

This gave him an idea.

Was it a good idea though? He needed to occupy the past Baldrick and stop him releasing the Gelfs.

He licked his lips nervously and picked up the communicator. How did his Lordship speak?

"Blackadder to Baldrick," he said.

"Is that you Milord? Have you got a cold? If my voice goes I always eat a raw frog." came his voice, crackling over the airwaves.

"And that helps?" asked Baldrick.

"I didn't say it helps; I just always eat a raw frog."

"Shut up Baldrick, or else I'll do something unpleasant to you probably involving a bath, a turnip and an electric iron!"

"Yes Milord. You still sound peculiar milord, almost like I'm talking to myself!"

"I've spilt some red wine in the officer's mess, come and clear it up."

"Yes Milord! On my way!"

Baldrick gave himself a small cheer and put the communicator back on the side. That should keep the previous Baldrick occupied, now to escape as quickly as possible.

He ran out into the corridor, picking up an officer's hat as he went and jamming it on his head.

Baldrick might be small, smelly, and less likely to win Mastermind than a bowl of spaghetti, but hanging around Blackadder for so long had given him some small amount of weasel cunning.

He knew it was quite possible that the other Baldrick would make it to the Gelf deck anyway, so he would have to get there first and, if possible, distract him with other things. He scampered down the corridor towards the lift, his newly acquired hat nearly bouncing off with each stride.

He took off the hat and pressed the button for the lift. He pressed it several times impatiently.

The lift door pinged open and there in front of him was without a doubt an absolute stunner, apart from one minor facial hair problem she had. He sighed, she reminded him a bit of his girlfriend, except apart from the stunning bit. He got in the lift and she fixed him with a beady eye. Now Baldrick was not psychic, but he did get the feeling that if he mentioned her beard the doctors would be trying to extract a turnip inserted in him blunt end first.

"You!" she said imperiously to Baldrick. "Have you seen two men? One smelly, ugly one and one who looks like a finalist for Come Dancing?"

Curiously he could hear some muttering coming from on top of the lift at this, but he ignored it.

"Why?" asked Baldrick.

"Because I'm going to kill them!"

"No. Is this the floor to the Gelfs?"

"Yes, but everyone's just evacuated that floor due to my beard incident."

Baldrick smiled. "That's fine then, I won't be disturbed. Love the beard by the way; my last girlfriend had a beard like that. They still let me visit her in London Zoo." The lift pinged open. "I won't be long."

Baldrick opened the door to the Gelf deck to be confronted with half a dozen guards with unfeasibly large guns.

"Your name Baldrick?"

"Errr no," said Baldrick. "He should be along soon, if you wait for him outside."

"Thanks," said the guards. Baldrick pointed to his officer hat he was carrying. "Sir, I mean. Sorry to bother you, sir."

The guards filed into the lift to stop the past Baldrick when he turned up,

Baldrick did a little shuffle. "I am so smart! I am so smart! I've got a…" What was the word for brain? "Turnip! I am so smart!"

He did the Baldrick dance. For those interested, it is like a bovine with mad cow disease. Sadly, he makes the cow look like she has style.

Baldrick rubbed his hands together with glee. He had done it! He had done what nobody else had done! Nobody but him had stopped the past Baldrick pressing the button to release the Gelfs on their Earth-eating odyssey.

It still seemed odd to Baldrick. Everyone had told him he had released the Gelfs, but you know, he really couldn't remember doing it. He knew he was going to, but those wretched guards had stopped him. He did remember wanting to release the Gelfs. He had done since he had first seen them, cute little tykes.

They said he had done it and they even had a picture of him on the security camera waving at them. He looked up at the camera and gave a small wave. So it must have been him.

He had seen the photographic evidence and just shrugged his shoulders as they pushed him into stasis.

He deserved it.

Obviously.

Baldrick looked out the window at the huge energy cage that contained a dozen of the huge Earth-eating Gelfs. Every now and then the energy bars would flare up as they tried to escape. There were about a dozen smaller cages in the room with him, filled with smaller Gelfs, well on their way to becoming the planet eaters that were outside.

One of them looked at Baldrick through the energy bars with huge soulful eyes.

Poor little genetic mistakes.

They didn't deserve to be held like this, they deserved to be free!

Baldrick's hand hovered over the button.


	9. Too many Baldrick's!

Red Dwarf characters owned by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor and Blackadder characters by Richard Grant and Ben Elton.

With thanks to Cmar for beta reading this for me!

Also thanks to Sunrise over the Tango factory, Cazflibs, Cmar, Radar-fox, Cyborg-Garfield, happyhooligan2001 and Ace Trax for the reviews so far! All very much appreciated! All reviews welcome

**Chapter Nine – The Red Adder**

Baldrick's finger hovered over the button that would release the Gelfs to their Earth-eating destiny.

"Stop!" shouted a voice.

Baldrick turned around. There was a zipping sound as the crew of Red Dwarf, Blackadder and himself unzipped themselves from the nearest Gelf. This Blackadder had flecks of white in his moustache from age. Rimmer and Lister both had fine moustaches. Also there was a Baldrick there as well. He also had a moustache. Unlike Blackadder's his looked like a dead rat that had first passed through the digestive system of a cow.

Baldrick withdrew his hand. "What? Why?"

"Listen, you smelly moron!" Blackadder waggled a hand at Baldrick. "Not you," he said to the Baldrick with the moustache. "Although you're a moron as well with an IQ so low you can smell kangaroo feet. Try and lever this fact into your brain - incidentally calling it a brain is against the trade descriptions act - if you press that button the Earth will get eaten!"

"Oh, I remember!" said Baldrick. He backed away from the machine. "So where are you people from?"

"The future! Or rather, your future!"

While he was talking the Baldrick with the horrible moustache looked at the cute Gelfs surrounding him and his heart melted.

They would be free!

The Baldrick with the horrible moustache edged towards the button and was just about to press it when another Gelf unzipped, disgorging a Blackadder with a white beard and the crew of Red Dwarf, all with long white beards. There was also a Baldrick with them with a long white beard.

"STOP THAT MACARONI BRAINED POOPY HEAD BALDRICK!" quavered the elderly voice. "OR HE'LL RELEASE THE GELFS!"

"Which one?" asked the elderly Rimmer pointing at both Baldricks.

The elderly Blackadder started pointing with his walking stick. "That one! The one who smells like he has a job collecting goat's urine!"

"Not helping!"

"The one so ugly he could turn the medusa to stone!"

Rimmer shook his head at this useless information, looked at his watch and sighed. The elderly crew crossed their arms while the elderly Blackadder squinted at the two Baldricks and put on his glasses. "The one with the moustache that looks like an elderly male cat has just vomited a doughnut covered in chicken soup under his nose."

The elderly crew glared at the Baldrick with the moustache. "Oh, that one!" said Lister. "Stop him!"

The elderly crew staggered up to the Baldrick with the horrible moustache and fell on him to stop him pressing the button. There were several cries of "me bunions!" "me arthritis!" "I'm creasing my fashionable cardy!"

The Baldrick with the ghastly white beard looked at the button and, his arthritis affecting him badly and wheezing badly, walked slowly towards it, complaining all the while about bunions the size of turnips.

The current Baldrick looked at all this with astonishment. Another Gelf suit unzipped and a positively ancient Red Dwarf crew and Blackadder and Baldrick scooted out on electric wheelchairs. "STOP HIM! THE ONE WITH THE BEARD LIKE A YETI'S ARMPIT!" shouted Blackadder. His own beard got caught in the wheels of the chair and sent him sprawling, sending his tartan slippers to the floor.

The Red Dwarf crew scooted round him with the elderly Rimmer in the lead. He realised this and immediately stopped to bravely cover the rear. This meant that Lister and Cat crashed into him. Lister's colostomy bag sailed overhead and crowned Baldrick rather elegantly with it. This sent him sprawling to the ground and stopped the elderly Baldrick from hitting the button.

The Baldrick in the wheelchair saw the button and accelerated towards the release button. His elderly face, like a prune with mould, scrunched up in concentration.

There was another unzipping sound and a sound like that of radio controlled cars and a curious squelching sound. Several brains in jars attached to crudely made electric cars with peculiar robotic limbs came rolling out. The jars spilt brain fluid as they trundled up the ramp.

"STOP!" came the robotic voice of Blackadder. "OR YOU WILL BE EXTERMINATED!"

The Blackadder robot stopped as he thought of this. The others trundled into the back of him, Lister's brain fell out of the bottle and was promptly run over by the Cat's brain jar. The Cat's jar was curiously fashionable with lapels on it.

Rimmer's brain jar (curious, considering he was a hologram, but try not to think of that!) trundled in front of Baldrick's wheelchair and tripped him up, sending the bearded Baldrick sprawling out of his chair.

The brain jar with Baldrick's brain in it (the only one with mould and a small family of mice living in it) laboured asthmatically towards the button.

One of the Blackadders yelled. "Why in the name of Satan's bottom do we always bring Baldrick with us! I mean wouldn't it be easier to travel back in time and kill the toad spawned dung beetle that first vomited a Baldrick onto this ill deserved planet?"

Another Gelf unzipped, disgorging the ghostly crew of the Red Dwarf, Blackadder and Baldrick.

"Stop him!" quavered the ghostly voice of Blackadder.

"Which one, sir?" asked the ghost of Kryten (and yes, machines have ghosts - that's why computers crash at annoying times like "I've just finished this chapter, a work to rival Dickens and Shakespeare and give me more money than J K Rowling! I'll just hit the save button as I'll never remember it again!" and the poor machine gets scared and erases all your work and then somehow goes flying out the window). If that won't haunt your mind nothing will!

"Any one of them, you silicon brained dunderhead who couldn't outwit a pocket calculator without batteries! Stop the Baldricks!" the ghostly voice wailed over the Gelf deck.

The ghostly image of Blackadder stood in front of Baldrick's brain jar and put out a hand. Baldrick just wheeled straight through him. "Bugger!"

"STOP!" shouted the ghostly Lister and Rimmer. They called upon their ghostly powers to turn Baldrick's brain jar over the floor.

The ghostly Baldrick (if you want to know what he looks like think of the most disgusting thing you can think of, times it by ten and you'll still be nowhere there. If Helen of Troy had a face that launched a thousand ships, his would send a thousand ships back to the forest they came from) looked at the button and, like a man possessed, floated towards it.

"Bugger!" said all the Blackadders in unison.

The ghostly Baldrick pressed the button and klaxons erupted throughout the station.

The energy bars winked off releasing the might of…

Well nobody, actually, since all the Gelfs were just suits to contain ever more elderly or ghostly versions of the Red Dwarf crew and Blackadder.

"I'm not meant to talk to you," said the Blackadder with the fine white beard to the one in the brain jar.

"I know, isn't the universe meant to end or something?" The brain jar rotated round, looking at what was happening around him, which was just a large crowd of Blackadders and Red Dwarf crew.

The Blackadder with the moustache stopped sitting on one of the Baldricks and sauntered over to the crowd of Blackadders. "So, have I just wasted my life trying to stop Baldrick when I needn't have bothered?"

"Oh no, if we hadn't turned up with various Gelf suits, instead of the original Gelfs, the Earth would be eaten!"

"So what happens now?" asked a Lister.

"Well, I don't know about you, but I'm feeling hungry," said a Baldrick. "Anyone fancy a turnip?" Baldrick looked over the control panel. "What does this button do?"

There was a cry of NOOOOOO! and Baldrick was held down by at least ten separate Rimmers, Listers and Blackadders.

There was a winking sound.

"Weren't there more Rimmers here?"

"The time lines are re-ordering themselves, sir," said a Kryten. "It will be as if this never happened. We're going back to where we started!"

_The beginning… again!_

Commander the Lord Blackadder stomped miserably down the corridor.

Blackadder touched his comlink.

"Blackadder to Bald…" He wrinkled his nose as the smell of Baldrick emanated through the station. It seemed to be getting worse. If he didn't know better he would say there was more than one of him.

"Yes, Milord?"

Blackadder stroked his small black beard. "Balders, what did I tell you about the underpants?"

His small monkey-like face screwed up in concentration. "Eeerrrmm, to change them more frequently than once a decade?"

"Yes, also the optimum word is 'under', you wear them _under_ your space suit."

"Yes Milord…" There was a shuffling of clothes and a screeching sound.

"Not now! Not now! For God's sake, Baldrick, what is under your space suit must forever be hidden! Science, nay the universe, is not ready for such a sight!"

"Yes Milord."

Klaxons started blaring out throughout the station.

Seconds later the tannoy blared out. "Lord Blackadder and his assistant to General Melchett please?"

"Come on, Balders, that's the third time he's called us in as many minutes. What have you done?"

An air of injured innocence took Baldrick. Well, injured at any rate, after Blackadder hit him. "I've done nothing my Lord! Apart from…"

"Nothing?" Baldrick raised his fist again. "Apart from what, Baldrick? Tell me now or I slice you into thin slivers and feed you to the Space Weevils."

There was a sound of many space boots on hard metal floor and they were surrounded by heavily armed Space Marines. General Melchett, his moustache quivering with emotion, stomped up to them. "Lord Blackadder and …" He waved his hand towards Baldrick.

"Baldrick, your Generalship," simpered Baldrick.

"Moordrick, I sentence you to…"

Blackadder waved a fist at Baldrick. "I'll get you for this Baldrick, if it takes me the rest of my life!"

"Twelve months tour of the isles of Bali and Tahiti!" said Melchett, his huge moustache cunningly hiding a smile. "Thanks to your timely intervention with the alarm, the Admiral has cancelled his visit before he could see what a mess the place is and close us down! You have saved the station!"

On the deserted space station three million years later, Lister, the Cat and Kryten are exploring. The torchlight falls on the stasis booths. On one of them is sellotaped a postcard with a picture of Blackadder and Baldrick on deck chairs in Bali. Baldrick's chair is made of turnips and he is smiling happily as he is drinking a cocktail that looks like it was made from a hollowed turnip. Blackadder looks very happy, or at least the part of him that can be seen looks happy. Or at least it would be surprising if he wasn't happy considering the four Balinese native women that were... Well it's a family show so I can't really mention it. Suffice to say that every now and then a Blackadder and a Baldrick do live happily ever after!

_The End_


End file.
